The Celebration Begins

[Professor]

Nation's first black fraternity, Alpha Phi Alpha, founded at Cornell, holds pilgrimage here Nov. 19
By Theresa D'Andrea

Alpha Phi Alpha, the nation's first Greek collegiate organization established by black students at Cornell in 1906, will prepare for its centennial with a pilgrimage to Cornell on Saturday, Nov. 19. The "2006 Centennial Celebration Kickoff" is expected to unite 700 to 1,000 fraternity brothers.
Alpha Phi Alpha memorial
An architect's rendering of the Alpha Phi Alpha Centennial Memorial that is being built between Barnes Hall and the Cornell Store.

The fraternity, now open to all races, has more than 700 chapters whose values focus on scholarship, leadership and service. During the daylong pilgrimage, members will march across campus and unveil a new centennial memorial to Alpha Phi Alpha.

The event will begin at 8 a.m. in Statler Hall with the signing of a "Pilgrimage Book of Remembrance" followed by a tour of the campus. During an archival exhibit in Kroch Library, participants will view artifacts of the fraternity, including rare handwritten original minutes of the fraternity's Third General Convention, fraternal essays, photographs of the founding student members -- called the Seven Jewels -- and copies of their academic transcripts.

A silent march at 2 p.m. from Barton Hall will visit the site of the centennial memorial -- a wall in the form of a "J" in recognition of the Jewels; it has a bench and a plaque and is in front of Barnes Hall. There, a service will pay tribute to the founding members. An academic convocation will follow in Sage Chapel where Cornell students receiving fraternity scholarships will be recognized, and Robert L. Harris Jr., professor of African-American history and vice provost for diversity and faculty development at Cornell, will present the second Charles H. Wesley Memorial Lecture. The first Charles H. Wesley Memorial Lecture was presented by former U.S. Sen. Edward Brooke of Massachusetts. Charles H. Wesley was the third African-American to receive a Ph.D. from Harvard, was dean of liberal arts and the Graduate School at Howard University, president of Central State College of Ohio, national historian for Alpha Phi Alpha (a position that Harris now holds) and the longest serving president of the fraternity (1931-1940). A farewell reception will be held at the Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art.

"A pilgrimage is a personal, spiritual, historic and significant journey, which one takes to a place and for a purpose that has profound meaning to that individual," Darryl R. Matthews Sr., general president of Alpha Phi Alpha, wrote in a letter urging members to participate in the event.

The founders of Alpha Phi Alpha came from very different backgrounds: four had attended preparatory school and three transferred from other colleges. Several experienced financial difficulties. They were united by their appreciation for music and passion for literature. Influenced by the teachings of such prominent leaders as Booker T. Washington, the fraternity originally served as a study and support group for black students facing racial prejudice on campus, both educationally and socially. All of the Jewels enjoyed success after they graduated.

Alpha Phi Alpha, which has been interracial since 1945, has many noteworthy alumni, including 1930s Olympic superstar Jesse Owens and Martin Luther King Jr. Approximately 125,000 men have been initiated into Alpha Phi Alpha since its founding. The fraternity's Ithaca-area alumni chapter, Iota Iota Lambda, is sponsoring the centennial celebration.

This is only the second pilgrimage of Alpha Phi Alpha members. The first, in 1956 to celebrate the 50th anniversary, drew about 1,000 members who traveled by chartered train from Buffalo to Ithaca.

Theresa D'Andrea is a writer intern at the Cornell News Service.

##

[ARTIC-U-LATE]

Nice. A bruh/co-worker went, waiting on him to get in to tell me all abt. it.

[Professor]

First African-American Fraternity Celebrates 100
November 21, 2005
By David Wittenberg
Sun Staff Writer
In the low, faint, winter sun, a column of almost 1,000 black men marched silently, ten abreast, down Campus Road. In the chilly afternoon, women, children, and local journalists took photographs from the sidewalks. As the men passed the engineering quad and approached Ho Plaza, McGraw Tower came into view over the treetops and rooftops, and slowly, a visitor made out the strains of “We Shall Overcome,” the civil rights anthem, being played on the chimes. At the front of the procession, three young men carried a banner across their chests, while the eldest men marched just behind. Most of the 1000 were dressed impeccably: long, dark wool coats over dark suits, gold ties, and gold scarves. Many of the older men wore fedoras, while some of the of the younger ones wore black leather jackets emblazoned in gold with images of Greek letters, sphinxes and pyramids, and phrases like “Lionheart,” “Aces,” and “Pharaohs of the Nile.” When the line reached Ho Plaza, the sea of people stretched from one end to the next.

The silent march this Saturday was a time of reflection and contemplation for college and alumni brothers of Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity, the first Greek letter fraternity for African-Americans. The fraternity was founded here in 1906. This weekend, the brothers of Alpha Phi Alpha kicked off their centennial celebrations with a “Pilgrimage to Cornell.”

Darryl R. Matthews, Sr., the fraternity’s general president, said that Alpha Phi Alpha’s goal for the weekend was a rededication to the fraternity’s traditional ideals of scholarship and service. “Our degrees and our educations are tickets not away from our communities but tickets back to them ... to improve and enhance,” Matthews said in an interview with The Sun.

“In the era of hip hop it seems to be so uncool to be scholarly ... We say, that’s not the case.” The march, Matthews said, was silent in order to be a time of reflection on scholarship.

At the march’s end, the fraternity held a ceremony unveiling and dedicating a memorial to its founders. The memorial is a J-shaped bench located near the footbridge between the Cornell Store and Barnes Hall and bears the fraternity’s motto: “First of All, Servants to All, We Shall Transcend All.”

The J shape represents the fraternity’s founders, known as the Seven Jewels. Members of Alpha Phi Alpha turn to the Jewels for their pioneering and scholarly spirits.

Among the fraternity’s founders were the first president of the Urban League, the first African-American Senate committee staffer, and the first African-Americans to be registered as an architect and an engineer, respectively, in New York State.

Martin Luther King, W.E.B. DuBois, Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, 1930s track star Jesse Owens, and jazzman Duke Ellington were all brothers of Alpha Phi Alpha.

More modern leaders include Detroit mayor Kwame Kirkpatrick, Buffalo mayor-elect Byron Brown, former Sen. Edward Brooke (D-Mass.) and public intellectual Prof. Cornel West, Princeton, religion and African-American studies.

The fraternity’s website also boasts 31 college presidents as members.

Saturday morning, Ozell Sutton, a graduate of Philander Smith College, was among the past general presidents of Alpha Phi Alpha who toured Sage Chapel in preparation for an event later that evening.

As the early morning light streamed through the stained glass of the otherwise dim chapel and the swells of the pipe organ being practiced filled the room, Sutton told stories of the civil rights movement. Sutton was southeast regional director of the Community Relations Service of the U.S.

Department of Justice from 1972 through 2002 and implemented racial and ethnic conflict resolution during events from Ku Klux Klan rallies to race riots. Sutton, who has been cited four times by Ebony magazine as one of the 100 most influential African-American leaders, was the Little Rock Nine when they integrated Arkansas’ Little Rock High School in 1957, and he was one hotel room over from Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. when he was assassinated in Memphis.

Sutton was the first African-American reporter on a white-owned daily paper in Arkansas, and one of the first in the south, working for the Arkansas Democrat newspaper starting in 1950, four years before Brown v. Board of Education, the Supreme Court decision that struck down “separate but equal.”

In Sage chapel, Sutton described a time when, during his tenure at the Department of Justice, he spoke at the University of Arkansas. Arriving on a Sunday afternoon, his white host offered to take him to church and called the pastor to give him a heads up about his black guest.

“The pastor said, ‘You trying to start something?’” Sutton said. Sutton’s host explained that he just wanted to take a friend to church who would have gone were he at home that Sunday.

The white pastor brought up so many questions that eventually, Sutton said, “I said ‘forget it,’” and took his host to the First Baptist Church, a black church in town. Sutton said that the difference in his white friend’s reception at the black church could not have been more different than his own at the white church. The black pastor, according to Sutton, was welcoming of the white man.

“Looks like we have a visitor here today,” he said, according to Sutton. “Come on down to the front.”

Sutton, who spoke at Cornell in 2003 as the annual Martin Luther King, Jr. commemorative lecturer, is in many ways typical of the brothers of Alpha Phi Alpha, who have been distinguished both in history and today.

Speaking with The Sun, Prof. Robert Harris, Africana studies, vice provost of diversity and faculty development, also stressed academic excellence and service to the community. Harris joined Alpha Phi Alpha at Roosevelt University in Chicago. Still an active member, he serves as the fraternity’s national historian, and played an important role in this weekend’s events. Harris spoke on “Blurring the Color Line” at the fraternity’s academic convocation Saturday evening in Sage Chapel. In that speech, he said that while what W.E.B. DuBois called the color line has been blurred during the 20th century, it still exists today.

“Although a fraternal organization, [Alpha Phi Alpha] is not strictly a social organization,” he said in his Sun interview. “Our degrees become a means of helping to improve our communities.”

Harris also said that strong alumni involvement in Alpha Phi Alpha make it different than other fraternities — nationwide, there are 350 college chapters and 350 alumni chapters.

“We maintain a strong affiliation with our organization after we graduate,” he said.

Harris said that molding successful African-American men is one of the fraternity’s top priorities. He said that the fraternity’s programs, such as “Stay in High School, Stay in College,” and “A Voteless People is a Hopeless People” are essential to its mission.

“To be a member of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, you have to be registered to vote,” Harris said. In light of the fraternity’s values, Harris said that one of the most important elements of Saturday’s parade was presenting an image of successful, engaged black men.

“You’re gonna have 700 or more college-educated black men, which is contrary to the stereotypical image of black men. And you can see them [marching across campus]. They’re all wearing dark suits, and ties, and they’re very successful looking.”

“The movie with 50 Cent, Get Rich or Die [Trying] — what values does that have? What values are being projected to our young people?” Harris said.

“Popular culture seems to run contrary to some of the ideas that [Alphas] advocate,” Harris said. Harley Etienne grad, a member of Alpha Phi Alpha’s local alumni chapter, said that the fraternity’s academic bent had served him well. Currently in absentia doing research for a dissertation in city and regional planning, Etienne came up for the weekend and said that a “network on campus of grad students and professors” who were brothers in the fraternity helped lure him to Cornell for his graduate studies, and helped him become acclimated once he arrived here.

Etienne also said that the fraternity’s ideals helped inform his research — a study of town-gown relations in Pennsylvania. Etienne said that the idea that scholarship ought to be of service to people and to one’s community was important to his research, and he hoped that it could be tweaked and applied to Cornell.

“[My] connection to this fraternity makes me even more loyal to Cornell,” Etienne said.

Coming back to see the first houses where the Seven Jewels, along with the help of Ithaca residents, first began their dream of a fraternity focused on black scholarship, achievement, and community service, was nearly a religious experience for many of the Alphas.

During his interview with The Sun, Harris displayed one of the gold scarves that the fraternity produced for the event in anticipation of chilly Ithaca weather. The scarves say “Cornell Pilgrimage” on one end and “2006” on the other. To the Alphas, Harris explained, “this really is a pilgrimage.”

[RBL]

Good Stuff

[darling1]

Congratulations on 100 years of service to our community and to mankind!

You have remained steadfast and focused on service through all of the changes this country and our community has endured. May you continue your work for another 100 years and beyond.


****raising glass**** well done!!

[onlyme]

I second Darling1.

[gamma_girl52]

I just wanted to extend a well-deserved congratulations to the men of Alpha Phi Alpha. What a great article! I'm sure it was a sight to see!

Please continue to do all of the wonderful work for another 100 years. There's still much to be done. I have to third darling1, Well Done!!

[crouching2tiger]

Greetings Most Honorable members of the FIRST BLACK GREEK FAMILY (SKEEPHI LOVE)
This is my phirst post but I pray that it will not be my last. This was my PHIRST A PHI A event and to simply state it, it was AMAZING. I CROSSED THOSE BURING SANDS IN TO ALPHA LAND ON NOV. 5TH 05. Yes, I'm a NEO, Fall 05..trying to hold it down. There was definetly more than 1000 bruhs that came out to show their suppot of ALPHA. I want to give a shout out to all the bruhs that took time out of their busy schedules to make this event a success; to my AKA's..stay sexy; to my chapter: BETA PI LAMBDA; Albany, NY; to: RHO SIGMA (SUNY ALBANY); OMICRON UPSILON (RPI); MU SIGMA (RIT); SIGMA ETA (SUNY NEW PALTZ); PI PI (UNION COLLEGE); KAPPA UPSILON LAMBDA; and SIGMA OMICRON (CLARKSON) ALWAYS UPHOLD THE LIGHT OF ALPHA.
RESPECT!!!
I am looking forward to the centennial in D.C.; that should be on another level.
06

Idris
#2 Crouching Tiger aka The Predator
Fall 05
Beta Pi Lambda
Albany, NY

[RedAngel]

Congratulations! Sounds like it was a wonderful celebration!

[TonyB06]

BEHOLD, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity!
Psalm 133:1

Last night I joined with my brothers, as did Alpha men worldwide, in recognition of the first initiate’s banquet, 100 years ago. As we dined on what they ate that October night—broiled lamb chops, peas-in-tubs, wild apple jelly, brotherhood punch -- I listened to the words and felt the fraternal love that flowed among my brothers. It reinforced, for me, what Alpha Phi Alpha has always been about; a greater opportunity to do the Lord’s work on this earth. I listened as sagacious men, including our 25th Gen. President, and chapter founders, men with hair now painted white with time, talked about the hardship, the price and the burden of fraternity; and the benefit of that work, felt by people around the world, but known only to brothers.

There were plenty of “war” stories, the camaraderie and brotherhood forged along the journey across the burning sands. But much more than that, we left that place more committed to who, and Whose, we are. After the war stories, if we think about “the secrets and mysteries” of the fraternity, and true meaning behind of the letters we wear, the questions will inevitably come. Do we mean what we say when we wear A Phi A? Is the character, heart and tenacity always as evident in our actions as in our words? …will it show when you post on this board?

Brothers, we know the eyes of others are upon us. It’s always been that way. But nonetheless, let us be about our work. Let us make the next 100 years as dominant as the past 100.

LET brotherly love continue.

[SIGMAtivity]

Congratualtions to all of you on the great things that your organization stands for and for the things that you are doing to better our community. Just a word of caution.... NOW more that ever WE need each other... OUR COMMUNITY IS IN CRISIS... So while you are celebrating ... make time for community. Again Hearty Congratulations! Peace--- Nothing missing and Nothing broken to you all as well.

[NinjaPoodle]

Originally Posted by SIGMAtivity

Congratualtions to all of you on the great things that your organization stands for and for the things that you are doing to better our community. Just a word of caution.... NOW more that ever WE need each other... OUR COMMUNITY IS IN CRISIS... So while you are celebrating ... make time for community. Again Hearty Congratulations! Peace--- Nothing missing and Nothing broken to you all as well.

Well said.

I too congratulate my fraters in greekdome of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity Incorporated.

[n4sir5]

Originally Posted by TonyB06

BEHOLD, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity!
Psalm 133:1

Last night I joined with my brothers, as did Alpha men worldwide, in recognition of the first initiate’s banquet, 100 years ago. As we dined on what they ate that October night—broiled lamb chops, peas-in-tubs, wild apple jelly, brotherhood punch -- I listened to the words and felt the fraternal love that flowed among my brothers. It reinforced, for me, what Alpha Phi Alpha has always been about; a greater opportunity to do the Lord’s work on this earth. I listened as sagacious men, including our 25th Gen. President, and chapter founders, men with hair now painted white with time, talked about the hardship, the price and the burden of fraternity; and the benefit of that work, felt by people around the world, but known only to brothers.

There were plenty of “war” stories, the camaraderie and brotherhood forged along the journey across the burning sands. But much more than that, we left that place more committed to who, and Whose, we are. After the war stories, if we think about “the secrets and mysteries” of the fraternity, and true meaning behind of the letters we wear, the questions will inevitably come. Do we mean what we say when we wear A Phi A? Is the character, heart and tenacity always as evident in our actions as in our words? …will it show when you post on this board?

Brothers, we know the eyes of others are upon us. It’s always been that way. But nonetheless, let us be about our work. Let us make the next 100 years as dominant as the past 100.

LET brotherly love continue.

B...

As I reflect on my 25 years, I think of the Brothers and Sisters met along the way.... I am grateful that I have had some true folks to tell me what I NEEDED to hear instead of what I WANTED to hear...

Though my political career is coming to a close, you know I still hold my life membership as charter member of the Vandals Association of Zambia (VAZ). I will still throw a brick where needed and lay praise where necessary. I rely on you and the rest of the crew to Keep the Knowledge Solid! Though I missed the Dinner due to molding my future Alphaman, I have made my reservations for December 2nd and 4th...to raise a toast to the Black and Olde Gold! Then we can finalize plans to hit DC in '08!

'06